If I walked outside this morning and yelled things about football, most passers-by would return with praises - or insults - of the Buckeyes, the Longhorns or the Trojans (some deluded people would applaud the Bobcats, but other than the Pitt game and that row of happy hour margaritas, our accomplishments leave us longing for more).
Anyone whose mind races to Zinedine Zidane or David Beckham is probably foreign or constantly ostracized by his friends for liking the sport of futbol - sorry, I meant to say soccer for the worldly-challenged part of my audience.
I like soccer. In fact, I like soccer as much as basketball, baseball and American football, and a lot more than hockey, which is just soccer for those bitter Canadians whose fields were iced over and who have as much coordination in their legs as long, wooden sticks.
Over the years, I've heard every argument against the sport: The scores are too low, it's confusing, soccer is for wimps, the occasional indignation at the shaming of the opposable thumb and even a disbelief in goalies as a whole.
A 3-2 score in soccer translates to a 21-14 score in football, and a football score of 41-38 is called a shootout, which is how soccer teams decide a tie. Weird. Soccer is not as confusing as a flea-flicker play against a 4-3 defense running a prevent zone: Soccer is 22 people kicking around a ball with just enough strategy to prevent an athletic riot.
The stakes are huge and the consequences can be deadly. The athletes are arguably the most talented of any sport in the world, and the games themselves are spectacles of ability.
The previous three arguments against soccer are just ridiculous. Wimps clearly make up the majority of curling, tennis and golf teams. Those wimps are too busy to play soccer, too. As for the lack of hands, I am irritated equally that volleyball players cannot kick the ball over the net. A disbelief in goalies is probably the result of an underlying psychological aversion to obstacles. My friend who hates goalies is probably a few years and a political science class away from loathing the checks and balances system, and I refuse to listen to anyone who hates democracy so much.
I think another reason lies at the heart of America's awkward feelings toward soccer - basically that soccer is not one of the nation's strong points. Americans are used to watching World Championships between teams from Los Angeles and Detroit or Boston and St. Louis. We absorb the best international players and organize them in Dallas or Miami. When an actual world championship occurs, such as the World Cup, people are thrown off.
To say that Americans have a tendency for arrogance is probably offensive, so I'll just say that Americans are arrogant, some with a tendency for humility.
But things will get better for soccer fans. The United States is ranked No. 8 in the upcoming World Cup. The national team has a solid leader in Landon Donovan, and Freddy Adu is a rising star with a back-story straight out of a Horatio Alger novel. All it takes now is for a few of the non-believers to convert. The other 5.5 billion fans around the world are not watching just because their televisions don't carry ESPN2.
When the ruins of Iraq mustered a team for the summer Olympics, the rest of the world recognized the passion and the love of a pure sport. Americans were shocked and awed ... that football wasn't a medal sport. Swallow some pride, take off the pads and grab a ball.
- Justin Thompson is a sophomore journalism major. Send him an e-mail at jt315004@ohiou.edu.
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